Repairing security status

Although the majority of security status losses occur due to hostile acts, such as piracy or griefing, you can sometimes lose a few points from accidental activities. Repairing this security status loss can be a tedious process but with a few alterations to your method, the time taken can be shortened. If you are in a hurry you'll want to go straight to turning in Clone Soldier tags to Concord/DED. See: Security Tags for more info.

Kill NPCs

Security status gains are achieved by killing NPCs from the various pirate corporations (Guristas, Sanshas, Serpentis, Angel Cartel, etc). Note that Faction rats such as Amarr or Gallente will only give faction standing changes, not security status.

Security gain mechanics

A security status gain occurs for the HIGHEST value outlaw NPC you kill within a 5 minute time period.

Each rat is worth a certain security percentage. In general, the harder the rat is to kill, the higher it is. You can get a good sense of what type of increase you are going to get by looking at the bounty associated with the rat.

Example

         Value         Sec Incr.
         ---------     ---------
         $ 11,813       0.0072%
         $ 37,500       0.0575%
         $ 74,063       0.0762%
         $142,000       0.0906%

To figure out what your new security status will be:

[math] \displaystyle New\ Status = Old\ Status + ( ( 10 - Old\ Status ) \times Security\ Increase ) [/math]

Example:

[math] \displaystyle \begin{align} Old\ Status & = -0.2140 \\ Sec\ Incr & = 0.0762\%\ ($74,063 \text{ bounty}) \\ \\ New\ Status & = (-0.2140) + \left( 10 - (-0.2140) \times \frac {0.0762} {100} \right) \\ & = -0.2062 \end{align} [/math]

Skills for increasing security status gains

You can maximize your security standing increases by training the Fast Talk skill - each level trained provides a 5% bonus to effective security rating increases. Other social skills also affect your security status in various ways.

The quick method

(The quickest method is to purchase and turn in security tags at a CONCORD facility. Barring that, as it can be expensive, you may choose to pursue the options below.)

Depending on your current skill level there are three methods to pick from which will provide for a rapid increase in security status. In either case, the basic principle is the same: kill the highest value rat available, and leave the rest. You can kill more rats after 5 minutes and start the process over again.

Note that for each of the three methods below you can mix and match as the local conditions dictate. Don't feel that you have to only stick to one method if another opportunity makes itself available.

Method 1: Mission rats

If you are a low level character capable of doing L1-L3 security missions you will want to pick up a number of security missions within 3-5 systems of each other. DO NOT PICK FACTION MISSIONS (Check EVE-Survival if you are unsure). Note that not all rats from missions and/or deadspace give a security status gain. In general, if it involves the Angel Cartel or starts with Pith.... then there is a good chance you will get a security increase).

Pop into the mission space - kill a high value rat as part of the mission pocket and then move on. After 5 minutes have elapsed, do the same for the next mission.

The nice part of this method is that if you get a couple of good missions in different systems you can milk each mission across 5-7 days. This is due to the mission reset that occurs each day so long as the mission remains uncompleted. So you can essentially 'mine' the mission for security status for a few hours each day until the mission timer runs out or you decide to complete the mission.

Method 2: Belt rats

If you are comfortable operating in low-sec or null-sec and have a ship capable of taking on rats in these areas, then belt ratting will be faster than mission ratting. Find a rat in the first system and kill it. After 5 minutes, find a new set of rats, and kill the highest level rat again. Keep it up until you get the security status gains you want or you get bored and go do other things.

While you could also do this in high-sec, in general, the value of belt rats in high-sec are so low as to not be worth it unless you come across an opportune target (i.e. complete random chance) and have no other options available in that system.

Method 3: Anomaly rats

Scanning down anomalies is an often overlooked method of finding rats in a system. If you can't find a security mission or a belt rat in a system you are mining for security status, it is always a good idea to check for anomalies. Rats in these pockets almost always lead to a security increase.

There are up-sides and down sides to anomaly ratting. One of the down sides is that anyone can obviously warp into the middle and finish it off while you are out security mining other systems. The upside, especially in high-sec, is that other people will often leave an anomaly pocket alone if they see that there are wrecks in the area -- it is not guaranteed but certainly, a pocket will persist until all the rats in that pocket have been eliminated.

Which systems should I do it in?

As stated above, the harder the rats are to kill, the more security status gain they are worth. Systems that have a lower security rating have harder to kill rats and thus are worth more personal security status gain. The most common guidelines suggest killing battleship rats in 0.0 space, but obviously, you should take all normal precautions for traveling in lowsec or nullsec space. Killing ratting ships is a specialty of many lowsec PC pirate corporations, so beware. For small security status repairs, low end highsec such as 0.5 systems yield valuable enough rats over time.

Once you have almost completed the security missions - break for the day. Tomorrow the mission will reset and you can kill the rats over again. This is especially important if the mission is a good test of your PvE skills. If the mission is too easy - finish it and see if you can trade up for a new one.

Notes

1. Skip any empire faction missions - these do not give security status increases.
2. Not all rats give a security status increase.
   1. Sentry guns for example have a bounty on them but do not give status increase even though other rats around them may.
   2. Named NPC targets typically do not give bonuses (e.g. Mercenary Lieutenant)
3. Trading up missions doesn't always work - if you get 2 or 3 decent missions you might want to stick with those even if they don't test your PvE abilities. This is because you could end up getting 5 or 6 missions in a row (such as Gone Berserk or Rogue Drone Harassment) that do not give any security status increase even though they look as if they should.

Missions to avoid

Certain Missions look as if they should give a security status increase but they don't. The following missions should be declined.

1. Any mission that is an empire faction mission (see EVE-Survival if you are unsure)
2. Gone Berserk
3. What Comes Around Goes Around
4. Silence The Informant
5. Rogue Drone Harassment
6. Cut-Throat Competition

Tags

You can also exchange tags for security status (see also: Security tags and WantToTrade: Tags for Security Status, a dev blog on the subject).